“Corona” courses at Morgan Territory

Table of contents

Morgan Territory Regional Preserve, not at the main parking lot

Dates: April 19, 2020 to May 31, 2020
Location: Livermore, CA
Course Setters: François Léonard, Marie-Josée Parayre
Type: Training; Two courses with real "bags" for practice/exercise during the shutdown (not at the main parking lot)

Photo gallery image (click to enlarge)


Note: The controls were picked up Sunday, May 31st. See below.


September 3rd Update

Morgan Territory Regional Preserve is closed due to the fire. You can check the status here (https://www.ebparks.org/parks/morgan/default.htm).

General Notes


We want to thank Gavin, Misha, and Rex for starting the trend on setting courses. To keep it going, we set two courses at Morgan Territory with actual orienteering bags.

Here are links to four PDF files:

In addition, you can enter your information this Google Sheet (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1gBymS0eNaPJEOWguP0qGBCAigTpPcNmgHpTgi-NMfAI/edit?usp=sharing) (i.e., as for the courses at Briones and Joe Grant). That sheet also includes links to the four documents and a link to a map showing the parking location (37.835639,-121.810583).

Here are the course details:

    Course    Length    Climb   Controls
    Short     3.8 km    185 m      10  
    Long      5.1 km    300 m      13

Editor's note: The climb on the Long course is shown as 285 m on the map, stated as 300 M in the course notes, and shown as 350 m on the separate control description. François has confirmed that 300 is the correct number.

Enjoy!

François and
(April 19, 2020)


Follow-up Comments

Thanks so much for putting together this course. These semi-permenant courses have been an absolute highlight the past couple weeks, and it was particularly nice to have bags out there. I was able to get out this evening before sunset and thoroughly enjoyed it.

For the BAOC folks who have access to only a B&W printer at home, I modified the colors and contrast of the Long map so that the contour lines are more legible with greyscale printing. The modified map is available here. I’m sure this violates all sorts of map protocol, but given the circumstances, it’s better than nothing.

Jeff Goodwin
(April 19, 2020)


Course Comments

I did the short course on Wednesday. Very nice course with good route choice on several legs and very detailed rock features. MT is unusual in the Bay Area because of so many rock features. What is the geology of MT that makes it so different from other Bay Area terrain?

Having real control bags was the best. I didn’t have to wonder whether I was really at the right control or not, or whether a cow had eaten the streamers. Streamers would have been problematic on this MT course because of so many similar rock features.

There were about five cars in the parking area when I arrived, but only three when I left. However, as I passed the main parking lot up the hill, it had cars all around the periphery.

Thanks François and Marie-Josée.

Evan Custer
(April 23, 2020)


RouteGadget

The Morgan Territory “Corona” training courses are now on RouteGadget. Visit RouteGadget for an introduction, or go directly here (http://baoc.org/gadget/cgi/reitti.cgi) to draw your route.

Since there was no E-punch, I set up the event using “no results” mode, which requires a bit more effort to enter your route.

Drawing Your Route Manually

You need to enter your name, total time, and optionally any cumulative splits that you might have taken. Both splits and total time need to be in MMMSS format. For example, 0:57 is entered as "57", 5 min 43 sec as "543", and 1:12:32 as "7232". That's easy.

Uploading Your GPS Track

You need to enter only your name​—​total time and splits are not required.

Since there are no E-punch splits, it’s very challenging for RouteGadget to fit GPS tracks to the course automatically, especially as our maps are not georeferenced. Thus, you will need to adjust your track manually more than usual.

When you upload your GPS track, there are three blue adjustment points that you can move to adjust your track. There are typically points at the start and finish of the track, and a third one somewhere in the middle of the track.

The trick is to add more blue adjustment points by right-clicking the track anywhere you would like to add a new point. I typically add a blue dot at every control location on my track, as those are easy to identify because of the notable direction change. Then I drag the blue dots to the corresponding control locations on the course. Note that you can remove a blue dot by right-clicking on it.

To see other RouteGadget events worldwide, visit http://www.routegadget.net (http://www.routegadget.net).

Happy Routes,

(April 27, 2020)


More Course Comments

Although I read François' notes about the bag at #8 being on the ground, I believe that the bag is now completely missing. Giving credence to this belief is the fact that there was a EBRPD service vehicle on the dirt road when I got there, almost directly north of where the bag should have been. The park ranger was near the truck, doing work of some sort. He had no problem at all with me being off-trail, and did not seem to know anything about a control bag that should have been nearby. However, if park rangers regularly drive on that road and are doing maintenance work in the area, I find it probable that one of them spotted the bag, and picked it up.

Also, although the bag at #9 was exactly where I expected it to be, it was lying flat on the ground, with no stand in sight.

I enjoyed the long course (except for perhaps the climb out of 6​—​ugh!), and it was nice to visit some new terrain. Thanks to François and Marie-Josée for setting this up.

Steve Gregg
(May 57, 2020)


Controls Verified Okay

All is good with with the Morgan Territory training course. Marie-Josée and I verified independently that control #8 is still there and in the correct location.

The bag at control #9 was reattached to the stand.

I test ran the whole course, and all the bags are fine.

François
(May 6, 2020)


Courses Closing

The controls at Morgan Territory will be picked up tomorrow, Sunday May 31, late afternoon. They will be used for another Morgan course that has already been flagged. Stay tuned. 😊

Thanks,

Marie-Josée
(May 30, 2020)